Sexual communication in the age of AIDS : the construction of risk and trust among young adults.

Sexually transmitted diseases are extremely prevalent among youth, and it is only by understanding the processes involved in negotiating sexual relationships that effective prevention and intervention programs can be designed.

This study explores sexual communication among young adults, how gender and sexual orientation influence negotiation for safer sex, the strategies employed for risk reduction, and the barrier to safer sex.

It assumes sexual behavior as a communicative form, both reflective and reflexive, subject to interpretation, and created interactively within and between sexual partners.

Data from in-depth interviews with 30 undergraduates at the University of California, Berkeley were triangulated with questionnaires (n=159), secondary sources and informal interviews with university officials.

Interviews focused on the normative influences of family, school and friends regarding sexuality ; how relationships were negotiated, and how trust and risk were constructed within relationships ; how strategies for risk reduction, attitudes about HIV and testing, and contraceptive practices were managed differently be gender and sexual orientation ; and what the barriers were to safer sex.

Friends, the social culture at university, and the interaction of the two with the developmental tasks characteristic of the period between adolescence and adulthood were more important influences than parents or high school sex education classes in how sexual relationships were managed.